The invention relates to electronic control apparatus for a vehicle and in particular, but not exclusively, to control equipment for commercial vehicles.
Heavy commercial vehicles are now designed and built with electronic control units (ECU1s). These are responsive to control signals initiated by the drive of a towing vehicle to control valves of a pneumatic circuit to apply braking pressure from a compressed air reservoir to brake actuators of braked wheels. Such an ECU may include anti-lock brake pressure modulation means (ABS) operable to adjust braking pressure according to sensed wheel adhesion loss on respective sides of the vehicle.
One such ECU is described in EP1167147, in which the ECU comprises a main data memory and electronics for specific braking related vehicle parameters. The memory is parameterized by the trailer builder using specialized equipment to enable the function of the ECU to be matched to the particular vehicle. This is analogous to the setting up of a conventionally mechanically operable variable load valve in a purely pneumatic system.
Customers and operators of trailer vehicles are increasingly requiring trailer electronic control apparatus to be adapted to control other functions. Different operators require different functions according to the manner of use of their trailers. Provision of special controls for different customers can be relatively costly for trailer builders and suppliers and, in each case, due consideration has to be given to the safety critical nature of the core system which controls the brakes.
The present invention seeks to provide a control apparatus for a vehicle which addresses the above problem
According to the invention, there is provided a control apparatus for a vehicle, which apparatus comprises an electronic control unit adapted to control actuation of vehicle brakes, which ECU has non volatile storage memory for storing braking related control parameters particular to the vehicle, wherein the ECU further comprises discretely programmable storage device to carry operating data for one or more auxiliary functions of the vehicle and is operable to check one or more incoming and outgoing variables and control algorithms against a predefined list such as to safeguard the braking function against error modes.